Synopses & Reviews
Once again, Sarah Anne Johnson offers insightful interviews with some of today's most popular and accomplished writers. Steeped in a thorough knowledge of each writer's work, Johnson asks about a range of topics on the writing craft, nurturing fictional ideas, and the daily practice of writing. The authors offer insights and practical advice that will delight their fans and be cherished by aspiring writers. Michael Cunningham recalls how the structure of
The Hours evolved as he wrote it. Edwidge Danticat honors the Haitian storytelling tradition she encountered in her childhood. And Jonathan Lethem reflects on working from inside and outside the literary establishment.
Johnson's interviews have been praised for her thoughtful and knowledgeable questions (Bloomsbury Review) that provoke thoughtful responses from her subjects (Publishers Weekly) and provide an opportunity to participate in intimate and often illuminating dialog (Library Journal). Her previous collection, Conversations with American Women Writers, was described as 17 miniature instruction books on craft by Publishers Weekly.
Other writers interviewed include Rick Moody; Donna Tartt; Myla Goldberg; Mary Gaitskill; Ha Jin; Bret Anthony Johnston; Edward P. Jones; Chang-rae Lee; Alice Mattison; Nancy Rawles; Marilynne Robinson; le thi diem thuy; and Mary Yukari Waters.
About the Author
Sarah Anne Johnson is the author of The Very Telling, The Art of the Author Interview, and Conversations with American Women Writers. Her interviews appear in The Writer's Chronicle, Glimmertrain Stories, Provincetown Arts, and The Writer where she is a contributing editor. Her fiction has appeared in Other Voices, and she is the recipient of residencies in fiction from Jentel Artists' Residency Program and Vermont Studio Center. She has taught the Art of the Author Interview Workshop at Bennington College Writing Seminars MFA Program, Leseley University MFA Program, and at literary conferences nationwide. Currently, Sarah is working on a novel about a woman lighthouse keeper in 1843.
Table of Contents
Introduction Michael Cunningham - A Bottomless Fascination with the Process Itself Edwidge Danticat - You Have to Live Your Characters Lives with Them Mary Gaitskill - Ive Worked Very Alone and Very Privately Myla Goldberg - Moving through the Language on the Page Ha Jin - Making the Sentences Fresh Bret Anthony Johnston - There Is an Unassailable Victory in the Very Telling of a Story Edward P. Jones - The Image You Woke Up With lê thi diem thúy - Writing Certain Experiences into the Language Chang-rae Lee - The Drama of Consciousness Jonathan Lethem - Discovering the Story Word by Word Alice Mattison - My Poems Began to Get More Like Stories Rick Moody - When You See a Rule, Break It Nancy Rawles - I Try to Write Rhythmically Marilynne Robinson - An Intensifier of Experience Donna Tartt - Character Is the Very Lifeblood of Fiction Mary Yukari Waters - Snatching at Random Bits of Light Bibliography